Francis Picabia

Sale: Palais Galliéra, Paris, March 31, 1976, lot 87
Edgardo Acosta Gallery, Beverly Hills (acquired by 1979)
Private Collection, Seattle (acquired from the above and sold by the estate: Bonham's, New York, May 9, 2011, lot 1027)
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

William A. Camfield, Beverley Calté, Candace Clements, Arnauld Pierre & Pierre Calté, Francis Picabia, Catalogue Raisonné, 1898-1914, vol. I, New Haven & London, 2014, no. 336, illustrated in color p. 276

The canvas is unlined. The impasto is extremely well preserved and lively. When examined under UV light, there are only a couple of very minor strokes of cosmetic retouching to the sky in the upper left quadrant but otherwise no other evidence of restoration. The surface is clean and the painting is in excellent overall condition.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

During the first decade of the 1900s, Picabia painted a small number of significant canvases depicting river and port scenes. As Gordon Hughes writes of another work of this period, “Making this work all the more distinct are the saturated colors—cadmium yellows and reds, turquoise and sky blue, bright greens, and violet—that look as if they came straight out of the tube. Often used in small quantities, these sharp, almost garish hues are unlike anything one would find in a Sisley, Monet, or Pissarro” (Gordon Hugues, “Francis Picabia, Once Removed” in Francis Picabia, Our Heads Are Round So Our Thoughts Can Change Direction (exhibition catalogue), Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2016, p. 27).

Picabia’s Impressionist period began in 1903 after he exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants, the Salon de Mai, the Salon d’Automne and the Salon Annuel du Cercle Volney, the combination of which garnered him critical acclaim and financial success. Contemporaneously, Picabia became entranced by Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley’s paintings, leading him to experiment with a brighter palette and a freer, more expressive brushstroke, illustrated to superb effect in the present work. Here, Picabia masterfully captures the stunning glimmer of the sun on the water, using tones of purple in the clouds, banks, and trees to create a harmonious, peaceful scene.

True to the dramatic fashion in which he lived his life, and directly coinciding with his marriage to Gabrielle Buffet, Picabia abruptly ended his Impressionist period in 1909, making a complete break with the aesthetic and selling more than one hundred Impressionist paintings in a very successful auction at Hôtel Drouot in Paris.